34 



PEOCEEDINGS OF THE 



X. JResistance : Suggestions of phagocytes. 



" Only nearly perfect, very healthy, vigorous bodies can 

 successiiully resist these parasitic wanderers, (Ishmael-like 

 roamers through the universe) when they are at their best 

 and we are exposed to their attacks : hence we note a 

 favored few who defy plague and pox and cholera ; 

 epidemics of all fateful kinds and remain serene, incautious 

 and unscathed. But wo to the weak, the ailing or the 

 debauched ! they fall an easy prey to the fatal onslaughts 

 of these tiny destroyers, everywhere watchful, voracious, 

 insatiate ; even as the Harpies of fable or the vulture that 

 preyed on Promotheus [sic]. Why this is so, I am unable 

 to say ; it is doubtless for the same reason that a stunted, 

 set back, or sickly plant yields to the massed attacks of 

 aphide hosts while healthier close by vegetation of the same 

 kind is nearly free from the vermin destroying the weaker 

 foliage : from what either results, our too scanty store o£ 

 knowledge avails us not to tell. It may be that, precisely 

 as the spermatozoa, which Leeuwenhoek in 1677 discovered 

 existing in the bodies of men ; so other living germs, antago- 

 nistic to the evil kinds, may oppose the latter in undebilitated 

 systems and wage war upon the humors in our blood." 

 (pp. 25-26.) 



" If the system is in proper condition one will 



go as safely through any contagion as a diver in Halley^s 

 suit through the water of the sea, but who is so wise as to 

 know when he is absolutely hale and hearty ? one fatal 

 moment of inviting weakness, and wo ! the insidious germ 

 has found a foothold. 



" Then comes the difficulty of dislodgment. These creatures 

 floating numerously through the entire atmosphere and only 

 able to thrive in a congenial harbourage: just as the Tobacco 

 Worm can subsist but on the foliage of the plant from which 

 it receives its name — once having effected this subtle lodgment 

 in our systems, are there protected by phlegmatic or viscid 

 excretions partly emanating, perhaps, from their own 

 organisms and partly consisting of corruption thrown out 

 by the irritated tissues for the purpose of resisting the 

 invasion : as observed in putrid sore throat and in catarrh ; 

 and then withstand many substances that otherwise would 

 immediately kill them. 



" Do not misunderstand me : I do not mean to say that 

 all diseases are thus contracted, but only those that are 

 similar to those I have mentioned. Nor do I assert that the 



